It was May 21, and Silver had been ice free for a week. I fished it after ice out last year, in the beginning of June, and caught several mackinaw up to 7 pounds. This year appeared to be different. Joseph and I fished from 5:30 to 10:30 am without a strike. We fast trolled half my overstuffed tackle box of minnow plugs, then slow trolled a variety of flashers and dodgers, which caught me my big fish last year. I can't say we weren't kept busy, though, because the lake was full of debris, and we had to pull weeds, pine needles, and sticks off our lures every few minutes. This is the plague of early season trollers. An entire winter and spring worth of material is blown onto the lake from the surrounding forest, then it's all dropped into the water in a week and a half when the ice breaks up. Underwater weeds that died during the winter also float up, adding to the soup.

When this lake is calm, You can often see trout at the surface, feeding on abundant insects. This day there were flying ants, some tiny black things that bit, mayflies, and quite a few lady bugs that Joey caught and played with in lieu of fish. Schools of rainbows will eat these bugs, sometimes suspended over deep water, and sometimes mackinaw will be beneath them, feeding on the smaller trout. A great technique here is to look for this surface commotion, then troll right through it with a long line. We hadn't been able to locate feeding fish this way all morning, though, until Joe pointed to a splash offshore.

"There's barely any sticks or junk in the water over here, either!." he yelled. He was right; the wind had been coming from the south all morning, pushing the debris into the north end, where we'd been. Maybe here we'd have a chance. We crammed the rest of our sandwiches in our mouths and rushed to launch the canoe as two more sets of ripples appeared further down.

I tied on two brand new plugs, a jointed, #9 clown pattern Rapala and a Berkeley Frenzy Minnow, then I handed one rod to Joe. We accelerated toward the commotion and opened the bails on our spinning reels, dropping our floating lures into the water then letting line pour off our reels as we moved forward. When we had let out 100 yards, we checked our drags, then began trolling along the shore in gentle S-curves. " Our baits should just be passing by those fish now." I said, and one of the rods jumped. It then stayed just a little bent, like it had once again picked up some weeds. I reeled half way in, then suddenly, the dead weight came to life and started pulling. Handing the rod to my son, I grabbed my camera, then the net. He quickly brought the fish in, but then it made several short, powerful runs under the canoe, finally tangling around the motor, where I netted the 15 inch brown. It was his first Salmo Trutta, and he smiled for a quick photo then smiled again when I asked him the big question.

"Catch or release?"

"Release. It's really beautiful."

We hooked and turned loose three more browns from 11 to 13 inches in the same area over the next half hour; they liked the Rapala and the Frenzy equally. By 1:00, the wind had started back up, and we told my wife we'd be home at noon, so we left.

Obviously, minnow plugs work here. Once the debris clears, flashers and dodgers trolled through these groups of feeding fish or along drop-offs produce great action as well. Try the smallest size Rebel Crawdad for the stocked rainbows later in summer: troll it slow on a long line, with Powerbait smeared into the little hole where the crayfish imitation's pincers join.

Caples Lake